How to decide if it's worth renting out primary residence?

[Kristin Brancaleone]

Hi there!  In about 2-3 years, my family will be buying land and building our own home.  We were going to sell our primary residence (O.C. California) at that time, but my mom keeps telling me that our house is the "perfect rental home".  I understand what she means- it's in a great neighborhood, walking distance from good schools, and we bought it at the bottom of the market (406,000 which is now paid in full, and now the zestimate is 600,000).  We can get at least 2800.00 per month.  I'm thinking in the next 5-10 years it may need a new roof, new shower, and other repairs.  We will be within a few hours driving distance of this home after we move. 

Basically, this house wouldn't meet the 1% rule criteria if I were looking at it objectively, so I'm leaning toward selling.   But are there other advantages that come into play when deciding to keep or sell, such as tax considerations, ease of paperwork, etc?  Somewhat passive cash flow is important to me to free us up physcially and mentally to focus on building our new home when the time comes. If we did sell, we would want to invest the money somehow to gain passive income.

I appreciate your input!